The scale of attacks on websites and blogs worldwide is rising, and things are only going to get worse.
It’s probably safe to assume that if you haven’t been hacked yet, then it’s inevitable that at some point in time someone will attempt to hack into your site.
On March 11, 2014, technology sites like Cnet.com reported that 162,000 WordPress-powered websites had been hacked.
Thousands of websites and blogs are attacked every year! Could your website be next?
(Image: Blog Defender)
According to the Cnet report,
“With some old-fashioned trickery, hackers were able to get more than 162,000 legitimate WordPress-powered Web sites to mount a distributed-denial-of-service attack against another Web site.”
(Source: cnet.com/news/ddos-attack-is-launched-from-162000-wordpress-sites)
According to security firm Sucuri, hackers had leveraged a well-known flaw to attack unsuspecting WordPress web sites and direct a distributed-denial-of-service cyber attack (DDoS) towards another popular website.
You may think that the information in your website has no value to hackers, but the reality is that to a hacker, all websites provide an opportunity to gain some benefit at your expense.
If a malicious user can exploit a flaw in the system, the web site can then be used to target other valuable web sites.
The truth is that malicious bots are probably trying to hack into your website or blog at this very moment. Whether they can do this successfully will depend on how difficult or easy you have made it for them to continue trying until they work out how to break in, or are forced to give up and decide to look for an easier target.
How Much Information Are You Broadcasting To Hackers About Your WordPress Site?
Does your website run on WordPress? If so visit a site like Hackertarget.com and run your website through their WordPress security scan …
(Hackertarget – WordPress Security Check Source: https://hackertarget.com/wordpress-security-scan)
You will see that the check will display a number of results and information about your site setup …
(Hackertarget – WordPress security scan results. Screenshot: Hackertarget.com)
It should be obvious after using the above tool that if you are able to freely access all of this information, then so can hackers.
(Product image: Blog Defender)
Being able to see which version of WordPress you are using, which plugins and themes you have installed on your site, and which files have been uploaded to certain directories can all be potentially valuable information to hackers, as this can inform them about exploitable security weaknesses, especially in older versions.
Fortunately, there is a solution that will stop broadcasting all of this information about your site and protect against malicious attacks.
Blog Defender Security Product Suite For WordPress
Product Description
The product is a package of WordPress security video tutorials, plugins and tools, plus a WordPress security PDF/DOC file.
Matt Garrett, the developer of BlogDefender developed BlogDefender after noticing that a WordPress-driven site he set up for his mother had been hacked into. This site was fairly new and had literally no value to offer, yet it still was hacked.
Matt only became aware of the event after being suspended by his host and noticing that a significant amount of suspicious activity had occurred within his site, as well as the addition of a number of malicious files by whoever had broken into the site.
(Screenshot source: BlogDefender site)
This simple example illustrates the fact that every website is valuable to hackers.
Blog Defender scans you web site for security holes …
And then shows you how to fix these quickly, easily and inexpensively …
WordPress Plugins
The product suite includes three plugins:
Plugin #1 “Automated Backups” in the Blog Defender product suite helps you schedule automated backups …
(Product image source: Blog Defender)
The “Automated Backups” plugin lets you do automated backups to your server, third-party servers and cloud storage solutions using different backup methods, automate complete or partial backups, exclude files or tables from your backups, restore backups, replace URLs (useful when migrating sites to new domains or server locations), do bulk text string replacements in your WordPress database, perform malware scans and blacklist checks automatically, and more.
Plugin #2 provides WordPress security …
(Product image source: BlogDefender.com)
This plugin performs a range of essential website protection functions (see “Plugin Features” section below).
Plugin #3 lets you scan WordPress sites to see whether anything has been changed, and fix any problems it finds …
(Product image source: Blog Defender)
Pro Plugin # 3 also scans content to see if any malicious content have been added to your site, bans bad bots, blocks brute force attacks and detects any content leeching (where others benefit from your content without offering anything in return).
Videos
In addition to the plugins, Blog Defender also includes several training videos and training guides that will show you exactly what you need to do to protect your site from hackers …
(Screenshot image: Blog Defender)
For more details, visit the plugin site here:
Benefits
Below we have listed just a few of the benefits of using Blog Defender to make your WordPress site invisible to hackers and botnets on your web site:
Quick And Simple To Install And Implement
The Blog Defender plugins are really easy to install. Just upload them to your Plugin folder via your admin account and activate.
Very Simple And Easy To Follow Training
Blog Defender can be used as an easy-to-follow DIY training product that takes you through the website security process and shows you what to do, including how to set things up, and even which free plugins you should use to get things done.
Some additional benefits and advantages include:
- Secure your site from hackers, spammers, botnets, data miners and malicious users whose aims is to ruin your business for personal and financial gain at your expense.
- Helps Avoid Intellectual Property Theft – If you’re an information product author (e.g. downloadable e-books, video tutorials, etc.), your work can be stolen and end up as freeware on free download sites.
- Avoid Getting Suspended By Your Web Host And Deindexed By Search Engines – When a website has been hacked, expect to go through a great deal of inconvenience and aggravation. It can take days to uncover problems and sort through any issues these have caused. During this time, your, blog could get suspended by your host, or even deindexed by search engines. In addition, your contacts could be spammed, your subscriber list and financial details can be stolen, you could be fined or even charged with fraud, and much more.
Plugin Features
Blog Defender provides many great features to WordPress users.
Blog Defender helps you fix all of the following issues:
- Hosting Security Advisory
- WordPress Plugin Security Audits
- WP Theme Security Audits
- Anti Brute Force Security
- Anti Cross-Site Scripting
- MySQL Database Security
- Nefarious Traffic Blocking
- Hide WordPress ‘Tell Tale’ Signs
- Anti-Comment Spam Blocking
- File Monitoring
- Monitor Links
- Known Offender Blocking
- Automate Core Updates
- WordPress Security Audit
- Tightening Server Security
- Kick Out Policy
- Online Reputation Checking
- And More …
Blog Defender follows a logical process to help protect your website, addressing potential hosting security issues, using tools to identify risky WordPress themes and WP plugins, and then helping you implement website-wide security using the tools and plugins provided.
(Blog Defender WordPress security process. Product image: BlogDefender website)
Feedback From Users
Below are just some testimonials and comments plugin users have published about Blog Defender:
“You are literally walked through the process!” Nikki Stephens, www.nikkistephens.com
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”Just one tip could have prevented my blogs getting hacked!” Richard Legg – www.richard-legg.com
Useful Tips
According to Matt Garrett, the plugin developer, since Blog Defender was released back in 2012, no sites using Blog Defender were hacked.
Matt Garrett states on his site, however …
“With the volume of attacks nowadays … we probably won’t hold forever, so we’ve been busy creating even tougher WordPress security.”
The war on hackers is an escalating arms race and all security solutions are only as good as the information and tools developers can harness. The latest release of Blog Defender creates an easier security solution that doesn’t need constant attention, is quite inexpensive and it’s as good if not better than most premium security products or services currently being offered at a higher price.
Blog Defender Support
The product is well-supported, can be used by both Mac and PC users, is compatible with the latest WordPress release and is backed by a no-risk, thirty day, full money-back guarantee.
Plugin Price
Blog Defender is normally available with a personal license only for use on unlimited sites. When we last checked, however, it was also being sold with Developer rights, allowing users to secure client sites as well.. Cost = $47.00.
Please Note: The cost to purchase the Blog Defender product depends on whether there are any promotions or limited-time special offers. The above reflects the price when this content was published. This may or may not be the actual pricing set by the plugin developer when you visit the website and you may be shown additional upsells or one-time offers after you’ve purchased.
Check the plugin’s website for the current pricing here:
Additional Info
For installation instructions and tutorials, FAQs, support helpdesk, contact details and more, visit the Blog Defender website.
Use These Plugins
Regardless of the kind of business you run or plan to run online and how small you think your web presence is, website security is something you cannot afford to ignore.
WordPress is a very secure platform, but neglecting basic maintenance tasks like ensuring that your WordPress core files, plugins and WordPress themes are kept updated to their latest versions, tightening file and data protection and taking other necessary precautions can have disastrous consequences.
Adopting security policies like the one Blog Defender provides, will help you understand what your security responsibilities as a website owner are, what hosting companies can and can’t do if your website is hacked, what security features to look for in a webhost, and which tools can make the process of securing your WordPress installation easier.
To learn more, visit the plugin website here: Blog Defender
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